Kids catch up in the kitchen

By Chloe Prince
STUDENTS at Oatlands Primary School have become master chefs in their new home economics kitchen.
All year levels, even the preps, have been using the kitchen as an incorporated part of the school curriculum. These future chefs are learning to incorporate their class work into their cooking. For the preps, each lesson follows their letter of the week.
This week it was all about the letter G, which meant cooking Gingerbread men.
“The kitchen is a great link to real life and it also incorporates the students’ literacy program too,” said prep teacher Lisa Mills.
“The children do all the cooking except for the young ones who aren’t allowed to use the oven, which would be the same rules as at home,” she said.
Purposely built, the room consists of six stations, each replicates a miniature kitchen. The benches in every station are at children’s height and stools are used for the tiny preps.
Successful cooking isn’t all the students accomplish; they are also learning about the different utensils, how a recipe works, food handling hygiene and the nutritional value of certain foods.
The grade six students will also use the kitchen later this year to perform a mock version of the TV show Ready Steady Cook for their families.